Gigi's Visit

Mark's parents left the morning after Nellie's birthday. That night, I picked my mom up from the airport. She was recovering from minor surgery and decided that it might be nice to recuperate with her grandchildren. I can't say she had an overly restful visit, but we sure are glad she was able to come!

The first day she was here was relatively low key.  On our way to swimming lessons in the afternoon, we stopped to pick blackberries. It wasn't until after we arrived that Gigi realized that it might not have been the best choice to wear white pants. Impressively, she managed to avoid getting any berry juice on her pants, but wasn't so lucky with blood stains from thorn pokes. Whoops! We only had a 1/2 hour in which to pick, but we still managed quite a haul.

That evening, while I took the boys to pick-up soccer, Gigi and Aubree made blackberry cobbler. Talk about nostalgia! I grew up on blackberry cobbler. Yum.

On Thursday, Gigi joined us at the "end of the week" family party at the sports camp Bryce and Thane had attended that week. The camp provided a hot dog lunch for all the kids and their families.

The chips were a messy hit.

Afterwards, we headed up to Katie's and spent the afternoon swimming at her club (doesn't that sound so posh?). The community club has three large pools, including a toddler wading pool.  The kids had a blast swimming.

Gigi stayed the night with Katie and we all met up the next morning at the Pacific Science Center.

I was excited to take Nellie to see the butterfly house exhibit, because she always gets so delighted when she sees butterflies in her books.  Seeing butterflies in real life would be even better, right?

Wrong.

Nellie was terrified of the butterflies. She clung to my neck and kept her eyes closed for most of our visit. Go figure.

Gigi loved the exhibit.

I think, perhaps, the butterfly exhibit has lost it's novelty for my older kids. Thane spent way more time watching a roly-poly bug than he did watching the butterflies.

Our main purpose in this excursion to the PSC was to see the highly touted Terracotta Warrior exhibit before it moved on to Philadelphia. It was expensive to get tickets, but everyone insisted it was worth it. 

Truly, the history of the Warriors is mind-blowing and fascinating...

Well, at least for the nine and older crowd. By this time, Nellie had missed her nap and was done cooperating. She stripped off her socks and shoes, pulled out her hair ties, and refused to be reasonable. She would not stay in her stroller. She would not be carried. She would not hold a hand. She just wanted to run away and wreak havoc.

I left my older kids with Gigi, and took the offender back outside. She may look happy and adorable in this picture (side note - the shoes were a birthday gift from Gigi, complete with glitter and foof for her shoe-loving compatriot), but I was not happy to have missed seeing the exhibit. C'est la vie.

My family needed to get back home for Aubree's swim team, but Katie, her kids, and Gigi stayed in Seattle the rest of the day. The played tourist x10! After the PSC, they visited the Ballard Locks, checked out motorized bicycles, saw the Fremont Troll, and toured a chocolate factory. Wowzers.

We'd discussed getting up early the next morning to go on a hike, but Gigi woke up out of steam. Remember how she was still recovering from surgery? Yeah. I think we overdid it a bit the previous day. Instead, we all spend a (not so calm) day together down at our house. Piper, ever the performer, decided the kids should put on a "Show."

Aubree and Anna wrote out a script, and the kids each performed an act of some kind or another. Have I mentioned how much we love living by cousins?!

 Gigi had to leave late that night, but we enjoyed every second having her with us.